


All the Light In the Sky

by CuChulainnX19



Series: The Many Deaths of Darth Baras' Apprentice [1]
Category: Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Crack Treated Seriously, Dark Side Sith Warrior - Freeform, Destiny Lore, Gen, Light-Side Jaesa Willsaam, The Dark Side of the Force, The Force, Time Travel, Unorthodox Jedi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-29
Updated: 2020-05-29
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:22:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24434281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CuChulainnX19/pseuds/CuChulainnX19
Summary: A Jedi Lord forms a last-minute plan to avert the effects of Skere Kaan's thought bomb. Instead, he finds himself nearly two thousand years in the past, on the cusp of the Second Galactic War.Jaesa Willsaam stares down a Sith warrior who has already turned her master to madness, on the brink of giving in to despair. Instead, she finds that even in the deepest darkness, the Force may provide a way to go on.
Series: The Many Deaths of Darth Baras' Apprentice [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1769887
Kudos: 3





	All the Light In the Sky

**Author's Note:**

> Jaesa Willsaam's story and romance are a lot of fun. At the same time, it's the sort of story that I very much like throwing a wrench in — and since the Barsen'thor is a bit young to slap the future Wrath around in the necessary way, and I have a thing for shoving Destiny lore on the Darkness and Light at the Star Wars universe (KOTOR/SWTOR especially), the interference is instead provided by Jedi Lord Tovan "Definitely Not Toland the Shattered" Scothar. 
> 
> The title is from "Oryx: Defeated."

The disturbance in the Force was profound, even physical, so much so that even the maddened Nomen Karr ceased his struggles and looked up in awe. Jaesa Willsaam, lightsaber scarcely readied to confront the Sith who had killed her parents and brought her master low, staggered bodily from the shock as a swirling nexus of energy, so intense as to be partly visible, exploded between her and her nemesis… and then vanished, leaving a human figure staggering backwards before he dropped, exhausted, to the floor.

Before she or the Sith could move, the figure began to right itself—himself, she corrected, as she got a better look at him. He wore armor, burnished silver plate scantily detailed with gold, with a flowing violet cloak, yet he shone in the Force as a Jedi, his light a beacon against the Sith and Master Karr’s sudden— _ not sudden, no, he can’t have always been this, no _ —maddened rage. 

“Where—Where am I?” He glanced at Karr and the Sith before focusing his gaze on Jaesa. Bearded, long hair tied partly back, not much older than her but scarred and his eyes burned through her.

“Nal Hutta.” The Padawan blinked, surprised at her own quick answer. “Who are you?”

The Jedi—for so he had to be—breathed in deeply, almost a sigh, before he answered. 

“Tovan Scothar, Jedi Lord and follower of Lord Hoth in the Army of Light. I was on Ruusan, the Brotherhood had a Force weapon, a thought bomb, and I wasn’t quick enough—what year is this?”

She told him, still incredulous at his speech to the point that she couldn’t quite formulate her questions. Jedi Lords? Army of Light? Ruusan was a planet, there could easily be a battle there, but—well, he had appeared out of nowhere through some sort of rift in the Force. Perhaps anything was possible.

“The Galactic Cold War,” the Jedi—Tovan—murmured under his breath. “Nearly two thousand years in the past. Yes, far more than I was expecting. This Sith—he has been hounding you, attempting to turn you to the dark side, is that right?”

“More than attempting.” The Sith’s harsh, gloating voice was distorted through his face mask. “I have revealed her Master’s weakness, the weakness of all Light, and I am here to claim her as my apprentice.”

“How very Sith,” Tovan sighed. “You murdered a couple of knights, a few legions of blaster-wielding non-sensitives, a couple defenseless innocents, and now you scheme to overthrow your master, and you think that makes you strong. You suppose yourself very high up on the pyramid of contumely, don’t you, boy?” 

Tovan laughed mirthlessly, a sound of pure, despairing absurdity. “If only you knew how  _ high _ that pyramid goes.”

“I may be nothing compared to our Emperor,” the Sith snarled, his lightsaber flaring viciously to life in his hand, “but I am  _ far stronger than you! _ ”

He leapt forward, and Tovan’s lightsaber came to life in an instant, an emerald green blade far more focused and tranquil than Master Karr’s, yet almost laced with a sadness that mirrored the Jedi’s own. He parried every blow from the Sith serenely, yielding no ground, and Jaesa felt a hope that had nearly died ignite again in her chest.

“Thus argues the champion of the kingdom of armies,” Tovan observed as he batted aside the warrior’s overpowering swings. “Passion unleashed like a primitive spear. Far harder to master one’s emotions — as the fate of your masters proves. I won’t deny there’s a competitive advantage to that focused anger, that violent self-regard, but it falls far short of outright supremacy.”

Almost too quickly for Jaesa to follow, Tovan wrenched the Sith warrior’s arm out of position with the Force and cut the hand that had clung to his lightsaber from its arm. With a scream of rage, the warrior summoned the weapon with his remaining arm, slashing ferociously at the strange Jedi’s head—but his arm froze in midswing as Tovan Scothar’s emerald blade pierced his heart.

“One law, one tower, one army. A gentle place ringed in spears.” Tovan seemed to be quoting something, though Jaesa had no idea what philosophy he might refer to. “Call it the dream of small minds if you must, and it certainly isn’t the easy path, but such complexity has a strength of its own, far preferable to the empty husks and ribbons that the Darkness leaves behind.”

He deactivated his lightsaber, leaving the body of the Sith warrior to fall to the ground as he turned to Jaesa. “Padawan,” he bowed deeply, “I am truly sorry for your suffering. Let us bring your Master before the Council, and then, if you would have me, I will do what I can to help you finish your training… and to make your way through your grief.”

Jaesa swallowed, staring at him, before she finally nodded. “Thank you, Master Tovan. I—I don’t know what to do, now. Master Karr, he… he always said the light side was stronger, and yet… he—”

“We are all flawed, Padawan.” Tovan took Jaesa’s hands in his, holding her with a warmth she had never felt. “Your Master, Karr… his flaws got the better of him. Simply being a Jedi does not, cannot, guarantee one’s skill in the Force or with a lightsaber, and finding oneself outmatched and threatened with death is a terrible trial. Great Masters have fallen to the dark side under lesser temptations before.”

“Yet you were able to defeat the man who bested him. Jaesa Willsaam, Sith apprentice… I would have fallen if you hadn’t shown up,” she realized with certainty, looking tearfully up at the Jedi lord.

“We all have our trials,” Tovan smiled, releasing her to survey the room; as he did so, Jaesa realized the Sith troopers had vanished, apparently not favoring their odds against the man who had cut down their lord, however distracted he appeared. “The darkness seeks power above all else, the strength to decide what lives and what dies so absolutely that nothing will ever exist except by the Sith lord’s decree. When that power is set upon the galaxy, whether by Skere Kaan and his Brotherhood of Darkness or by Valkorion and his hidden empires, it is impossible to evade the challenge entirely. But if we must challenge the darkness with its own arguments, we need not mistake it for the only principle at play. I survived decades of war against the Sith only by becoming strong in my own right, by understanding myself and my enemies alike. The holocrons I studied were left by masters like Revan and Sunrider, not Atris and Lamar. You have great strength within you, Jaesa Willsaam, and a gift as powerful as your trials have been cruel. Come, we should return to Coruscant.”

That, of course, precipitated the awkward reminder that Coruscant, during the Great Galactic Wars, was not in fact the seat of the Jedi Order, as well as Jaesa’s explanation of the information Nomen Karr had been pursuing—part of his vendetta against Darth Baras, but valuable information all the same. The fallen Jedi Master remained oddly silent as Tovan and Jaesa escorted him, still bound, to the ship he and his former padawan had arrived in, the body of the dead Sith carried by his twi’lek former slave.


End file.
